


Vocal

by scottmczall



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: A little, Angst, F/M, Fluff, Romance, but just kinda fluff, i guess idk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-18
Updated: 2014-09-18
Packaged: 2018-02-17 21:26:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2323715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scottmczall/pseuds/scottmczall
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lydia realizes she can't hear anyone's voices but Stiles'. They go after a solution for the problem.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vocal

**Author's Note:**

> This is way too long. Seriously, I did not mean to make it big, but well it is what it is. Have a nice reading, sweeties.

She could listen to everything. It was a particular sensitive day for the banshee. Things were  _loud_ and she was doing her best not to flinch at everything. 

When Scott talked to her she fell into deeper worry, since she could not, for the life of her, listen to a word the boy said- only shoes colliding with the floor, lockers closing, paper smashing. No voices. It was ironic to no end, considering voices were extras in her life, never minuses. She did manage to read his lips and get out of some worried spiral of reactions. She didn’t want that kind of attention. She had been spending most of her time alone and if she could just keep that way it would be great. Lydia answered according to what she hoped he had said, so he smiled and went on his way. The girl sighed in relief and headed for the girl’s bathroom, locking herself in the first empty stall. The bell rang and she heard it far too clearly, so the crowd had started to disperse by the second. She hadn’t really been looking forward to class  lately  and her grades were excellent, as usual, so she didn’t see a problem with skipping. 

But someone did. 

Her phone buzzed on her purse and she took it out only to see a picture of Stiles grinning like he's got no worries in the world. Could he have a worst timing? He barely even called her lately.  _It just had to be now, didn’t it?_ ,  she thought, snorting to herself and answering the call. Maybe a part of her wanted to freak him out by leaving him with dead silence, since she wouldn’t be able to answer unheard questions.

“Yes?” Her own voice she could hear, thankfully. Things didn’t have to get any creepier.

“Hey, where are you? It’s chem class, I need my partner.” His voice sang to her like a choir of angels, giving her a jolt of energy that rose her to her feet. Lydia's eyes widened comically as she spinned slowly around the little cubicle in discredit.

“What? Stiles!” She yelled, covering her mouth half a second later. It’d be better if no one found out she was hiding inside the bathroom. It was a little pathetic and she would be removed and put into some classroom.

“What? Jeez, I’m just asking!” 

“No! That’s not-” She chuckled. “Wait, how are you calling me?" She frowned to herself. "Mr. Diggles hates phones. And  you .” 

“I left the class to call you, genius.” Lydia could practically  _hear_ him roll his eyes at her. She hoped he’d know just the same when she rolled hers.

“Can you meet me in the girl’s bathroom? The one closest to my locker.” Lydia bit her bottom lip in anticipation. She couldn’t help but think it was just a phone thing. Maybe she wouldn’t listen to him talk if they were face to face. The theory was displeasing, but it was there either way.

“Uh… okay.” He sounded questioning, but she didn’t care, ending the call immediately. She had never felt like listening to Stiles talk so much in her life. 

Lydia left the stall, checking on the bathroom’s main door, waiting to catch a glimpse of the boy. He didn’t take long, she saw when his figure made a turn, walking sternly through the hallway. He looked nervous, gripping on his backpack’s straps for dear life. Lydia thought it was odd, but it was Stiles, afterall. No use questioning unusual behavior. When he got close enough she pulled him by the shirt, yanking him inside. He almost fell to the floor, but kept on his feet by holding on to the wall somehow. 

“What the hell?” He asked a bit too loudly.

“Shhh! Do you  want people to know we’re here?” Lydia glanced at the outside for one last time, closing the door right after. She turned to him once again and he was red like a tomato. “Why are you blushing?” The girl narrowed her eyes at him. She didn’t give him time enough to answer that, remembering why she had called him there. “It doesn’t matter.” Lydia said hurriedly, getting closer. “All morning I’ve been hearing everything a little louder and I didn’t even think about how no one talked to me when I came to school, but then I realized that I couldn't hear anyones voices.” Her explanation was sloppy, but she was in a rush to hear him again. She wanted an answer, just to be sure he wouldn’t be on mute like everyone else seemed to be. 

“But you heard me.” He frowned. “I mean, you heard me, right?” 

“Of course I heard you! I talked to you, remember? I  _am_ talking to you.” Her arms were crossed over her chest as she looked at him like he was the stupidest piece of human flesh she had ever seen. And it wasn’t the case. She was very much pleased to see - and hear - him. But lately it was just easier to be snappy at the boy. 

“Yeah, thanks for the snark, but why? Why  _me_ ?” Stiles adjusted his backpack roughly, clearly as impatient as she was. There seemed to be some anxiety around, but there was no time to dwell- they had to figure things out. 

“I don’t know. That’s why I asked for you to come.” She looked up at him with expectation. Lydia wanted him to have an idea, one of the groundbreaking one’s so she could go back to hearing other people. Stiles looked at her for a second too long, frowning again. “What?”

“Uhm, did you not hear that?” He asked awkwardly.

“No…?” 

“The principal just asked for Greenberg.” Stiles smiled sadly- if not apologetically- at her. “I was just about to ask if you hadn’t talked to anyone after me, but, well…” He sighed. 

“I hate this! This stupid  power . No one’s hallucinating but me. It’s so infuriating!” Lydia huffed, trying to keep her voice down. It was hard, given her sudden rage. She wanted to punch something and get rid of all that energy. Something was off. She was frustrated and angry, but there was something else and it didn’t belong to her. 

“Hey, it’s okay. We’ll figure it out, c’mon.” Stiles looked at her tenderly, placing a hand on her shoulder. It was relaxing to an extent. “What could’ve happened yesterday? When you were asleep, or something? Did you have any dreams?” He blurted the questions out easily, following the train of thought. She knew he was forming some sort of theory already as she reflected on an answer. She did have a dream and flushed just thinking about it. “What?” His eyes were darting randomly while he tried to come to conclusions, but his gaze was now directed to her, red faced like he was when she pulled him inside the bathroom.

“I-uh…” Lydia breathed a shallow breath, feeling her throat close. “I had a dream.” She swallowed slowly, trying to hold on to something. “It was, uhm- It was about you.” 

“W-what?” 

“It was a memory more than a dream.” Her voice drifted into no volume as the sentence came to an end. “From when I kissed you.” 

She remembered  feeling it and waking up like she had just had his lips upon hers. All though it was based on a memory, there was definitely something different about it. It lasted more and it was more eager.  _He corresponded_ , she mused. Lydia didn’t give it that much thought. It wasn’t a wet dream or anything, it was just a dream. A stupid, inconvenient dream that brought up something she so desperately wanted to smash down into oblivion. That kiss was meant to stop her friend from twenty minutes in his own personal hell- it was supposed to bring him back to reality, never meant to do anything else. Like it did. Because it  did . The damn kiss worked against her favor and it rose from the dead everyday, creeping out from her buried memories, like the one from the time she broke her mother’s shoe heel and threw it on the lake. That didn’t come back everyday to haunt her. It was where it should be- motionless and untouched, sometimes even beyond reach.

“It probably doesn’t have anything to do with it, though.” She added quickly, trying to get him out of an awed state.  _Too little, too late_ ,  he was already there. Lydia closed her eyes, defeated. They were never supposed to talk about that. 

She expected him to fall into a babbling section about their unspoken connection or some fairytale-like theory, but he hadn’t. And she was so  not frustrated or even disappointed by that. Not even a little bothered, really.  _Really._

“We should talk to Deaton.” He resoluted and she blinked twice before nodding in agreement. Sneaking out of school was easy enough of a task by now.

“So, what do you think?” Stiles closed one hand around the one balled into a fist, hopeful. Deaton usually had an idea about things, but he hadn’t been the most insightful when it came to banshee shenanigans, so Lydia had been skeptical about the visit. She couldn’t hear him, anyways. Deaton smiled mischievously, looking between the two teenagers standing in front of him. “What?” 

His stare melted into kindness as he started talking. Lydia didn’t find the patience in herself to actually try and read the man’s lips, so she just let her thoughts drift away, analyzing the place around her. She could hear the animals inside the room right after the wall she was looking at. They hissed, barked and complained. She wanted to go see them and she did, having very little to do. The bad thing was that she couldn't hear Stiles from in there, so after she looped the cages three times, finding that the animals were suddenly calm, she went back to the other room, already feeling the anxiety of not being sure if she could still hear the boy. She started to wonder around the room, feeling Stiles’ eyes following her at first, but he relaxed and dove back into the conversation with the veterinarian, arms crossed, drinking Deaton’s words like his life depended on it. And it wasn’t his life, no. It wasn’t even hers. It was just  _her_ and another one of her problematic banshee triggers. She wondered about when he would get over it. Over her. It couldn’t be easy to like her the way it seemed like he did. Especially when she mostly wouldn’t even hold his gaze for more than a handful of seconds before starting to go down a scary road. 

Stiles himself was scary. He was scary to the moon and back when he looked like he could actually pick up her pieces, or when he watched her with devotion. And the way he believed in her was overwhelming. She once knew she didn’t want any of that, but that had been such a long time ago. She had gasped just this morning, thinking about how she longed for such things now.

“Lydia?” Stiles spoke. It was the first time his speech was directed to her in ten minutes. She was relieved she talked to her, but not nearly as freaked out as she was prepared to be. His hums and ‘yes’s set her heart into place when she thought she couldn’t hear him anymore.

“Yeah?” She lifted her head, looking at him. “Does he know something? Can we fix this?” 

“Uh, yeah. But not here.” He was blushing again. It couldn’t be anything great, then. “C’mon.” 

They walked together outside and entered the Jeep again, silently. Stiles seemed tense and didn’t turn on the engine. Lydia was afraid he had to do something for her benefit and wasn’t comfortable about it. That would be unusual, sure, but not impossible.

“We don’t have to do it if you don’t want to.” She spoke coolly, not looking at him. Lydia heard him inhale sharply.

“No, oh my god. That’s not it. At all, Lydia.” He shook his head negatively, turning on the drivers sit, almost hitting his knee on the stick. “Jesus, I wouldn’t- there’s nothing I wouldn’t do.” He said seriously. Lydia pursed her lips, avoiding his gaze once again. She cursed herself. “I don’t know if you’ll be up for it.” 

Lydia snorted, not believing what he was telling her. She wanted to hear again, she was damn sure there was nothing she wouldn’t do to go back to normal. Before she could speak up about how ridiculous he was being, however, Stiles began explaining.

“Look, I told him about your dream. The kiss... And how we never really talked about it.” The boy sighed. He seemed  as much into the topic as she was, but something told her that he was just mirroring her reactions. “And he said you don’t deal well with pushing feeli-” Stiles cleaned his throat. “ _things_ . So this might be a reaction about these things you’re pushing away. Like your internalized banshee telling you ‘ha, you don’t wanna listen to these voices, so no voices for you. At all’, or something.” He gesticulated lightly. He wasn’t looking at her anymore. He was ashamed, for all she could tell- and she could tell a lot about him.

“So we have to… talk? About it?” She asked quietly. That  was  disconcerting. 

“Yeah? But first…” He took a deep breath. “I need you to know that I’m not, like, making this up. I wouldn’t put you against the wall like this. I feel as bad as you do right now, probably, and I just wanted to make sure you knew that I’m not rejoicing or something.” 

Lydia watched him shrinking as he spoke and asked herself how many times she had hurt his feelings without even realizing it. She didn’t feel responsible for any of the trouble she may have caused, because she wasn’t. She had no control over rising crushes, but it didn’t mean she didn’t care. His body language spoke volumes to her and she didn’t like what it was saying.

“I would never think that of you!” Her tone contained a certain level of anger. Lydia hated that he thought she saw him as someone who would pull something like that on her. She recognized the person he was and she wasn’t stupid to think something so absurd and low of him.

“That’s nice to know.” He chuckled humorless, staring at her again. He took a second before speaking again. “And, uh, did voices tell you things? About, uhm, us?” She could tell he was being careful about the question and the way he put it. She couldn’t blame him, even she felt like she was about to snap at any given moment.

“Yes.” The girl answered promptly. “But not in the way you think I did.” She proceeded. “I knew. I knew it when I did it, before and after. I knew there was no coming back from that because sometimes you take steps and can’t go back. And that was one of those steps. I wasn’t ignoring other voices, I was ignoring myself.” Lydia did her best not to drop the ball this time. “I don’t know how you did it and  _if_ you were the one to do it, but here we are!” She laughed dryly. “I don’t like feeling like this, like you could hurt me. I promised myself I wouldn’t go there again after Jackson, but then you…” Lydia shot him an accusatory look. “You are so much worse. We’re magically tied by some ridiculous ritual about a tether and you’re nosy and you talk too much.” Tears started burning their way down her cheeks, and it was surprising until the noticed the lump on her throat. She cleaned them quickly enough. “And you came along with your worrying and caring and I just fell for you like some stupid teenage girl and, now, all though I am a teenage girl, I am  not stupid!” She stated sternly, lifting her index finger to stress her point. “So there. That’s it. I’m in love with you and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

They stared at each other for a while after she finished talking. It wasn’t an awkward silence and it didn’t even  feel like silence- it was like some ridiculous cliché still-in-time moment. But that was before her hugged her. It startled her, so she stiffened under his embrace just a second before giving in comfortably. She told him she loved him in the most aggressive way and he had  _hugged_ her. As if that wasn’t enough for her, Lydia actually reciprocated it and broke down in what seemed like the oldest of tears. They erupted and it felt like she had been released from the biggest burden she had ever carried. And she hated that she felt it as a burden, because he wasn’t a burden at all. He was inconvenient, yes, but never a burden.

“Not that you don’t know, but I’m in love with you too.” He murmured and kissed her forehead. She smiled because his confession wasn’t new, but it was fitting and very much welcome. “Was that it? I mean, is that all you have to say about it?” His whisper was smooth and it made her breathless all of the sudden. She backed away from him, more than she needed to, really, then started telling.

“I did kiss you to stop your panic attack, but there were other ways I could’ve gone about it. For an example I wouldn’t have kissed Scott, or Allison, but I like to believe that if they were in the same situation I would be able to help.” Her explanation was clinic because she had decided crying on his shirt was enough for now. 

“This is really fucking unbelievable.” Stiles mumbled, amused. She snapped him an annoyed look. “Okay, let’s see if you can hear people again, alright?” 

They got out of the car once again and headed back to the animal clinic. 

The world spinned when she heard Deaton and she spinned right back, kissing Stiles as the veterinarian's voice filled her ears. 

Things fell back into place soon enough- it wasn’t that hard to adjust to hearing people again. They were back at the school in no time, so Stiles told everything to Scott. She talked to Allison and it was like an eighties romantic movie. She didn’t like it much at first, announcing that she had confessed her feelings to Stiles like she had serenaded him or something of the sorts. But the bastard grinned like it was the best thing as she spilled out dryly her uncalled-for feelings, which made things better. She wanted to see him happy, as sappy as it sounded. So she told once and then again, making Allison laugh with Scott. Lydia had a smile of her own quirking up the corners of her lips. It just wouldn’t go away, as it seemed.

When she was alone with Stiles again, she had to ask.

“Why were you so weird about the bathroom earlier?” Her eyebrow rose. The anxiety she felt was his. She had realized it as it washed away when she kissed him at Deaton’s. 

“Nothing.” He shrugged awkwardly, obviously taken aback. 

“Stiles, please.” She scoffed. The boy sighed, diving his hands inside his pockets. 

“I thought that you had asked me to, you know… make out, or something.” He confessed, turning red once again. “And, I mean, it wasn’t so delusional, obviously- we  _did_ end up making out eventually, but I was so ready to turn you down.” 

“What?!” She hadn’t meant to sound as outraged as she did, but there it was. Stiles laughed lightly, hugging her by the waist. 

“I just didn’t want you to lead me on. And I know that you wouldn’t do that, but… it is bad that I just really wanted to say no to you? Like, for once?” 

“I don’t think I should be your moral compass.” She replied with a beam and sealed their lips for just a second. “But making out in the girl’s bathroom is a terrible idea.” Lydia frowned. 

“You’re a better person than you think, you know that?” He chuckled. “And yeah, I can see that now, but when you- very violently- pulled me inside I wasn’t really making sense of things” The boy deadpanned. 

“I’m a good person, I know that. I did save your lives once or twice.” She said cockily. “Did you really think I was going to harass you like that before kissing you?” 

“No.” He narrowed his eyes, seeming unsure. “I don’t know? I mean I don’t know much about your making out manner, do I?” 

“Well, we have to fix that, don’t we?” 

The girl kissed him again, feeling his grip tighten around her. She could get used to that.


End file.
